Soccer Poet

Happy Holidays! Hope your Christmas was merrier than a Burl Ives claymation special and that your 2011 will be everything you hoped for. As for me, my 2010 closed in sensational fashion, but more about that later. Since the New Year is almost upon us, I thought I would write about 10 things that would make my 2011 even better.

10. The Georgia Bulldogs advance to the College Cup. We’ve lost some incredible seniors, but our cabinet is still well-stocked with talent and determination and hopefully it will all come together beautifully in the fall. Atlanta is the host city for the 2011 College Cup which would make it even sweeter for the Bulldog faithful.

9. 12 months without Tiger Woods, Brett Favre or LeBron James. I’m convinced that the only reason these three remain a story is because of sports editors and programming directors who insist that they are still interesting.

8. A moratorium on anyone’s major blunder being compared to, cited as, or otherwise referred to or referenced with Bill Buckner. Find a new metaphor, would ya? It happened in 1986. That was twenty-five years ago. Let it go, man. Let it go. Besides, the Red Sox have won a pair of World Series since then. It’s all good.

7. Kristine Lilly gets her own U.S. postage stamp. Seriously, is there another athlete who deserves it more? Who else has represented the United States at anything over 350 times? She’s a national treasure and I say we celebrate her before her legacy gets shuffled to the bottom of a very large pile.

6. A change in college soccer’s official scoring system that would mandate that shots deflecting off the posts/crossbar are recorded as ‘shots on goal.’ Betcha didn’t know. (86^ing the fourth official ain’t such a bad idea either. Just sayin’.)

5. Ryan Ferguson gets out of prison because his prosecution was so ludicrous it frightens me and should frighten you, too. You can read a recent update about his case from the front page of the Kansas City Star here.

4. Every professional athlete/actor/singer/performer that makes more than $500,000 donates at least 10% of his/her salary in a unified effort to combat homelessness and hunger in the United States. Anyone donating more than $5 million gets five tax free years. Anyone donating more than $10 million never has to pay income tax again. Bruce Springsteen writes theme song for the effort. Dick Vermeil cries.

3. The World Cup selection committee resigns in shame. Because it’s the right thing to do.

2. A NFL season without those horrible Coors Light commercials. What Coors executive keeps getting convinced that these are a good idea? Somebody check his pulse.

And finally…

#1 Peace on Earth, good will to man… and monkey. Amen.